


Star Light Star Bright

by MagicaDraconia16



Series: 2020 Bingos [15]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Gen, Minor Angst, Trope Bingo Round 14, Unexpected Friendship, references to canonical deaths, space
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:14:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24807568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicaDraconia16/pseuds/MagicaDraconia16
Summary: On his way to start Earth negotiations withactual aliens, Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes can't help missing his best friend, who would have loved to be here (once he stopped having a panic attack). An unexpected 3am meeting just might be able to help.
Relationships: James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Gamora
Series: 2020 Bingos [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1634290
Comments: 1
Kudos: 12
Collections: Trope Bingo: Round Fourteen





	Star Light Star Bright

**Author's Note:**

> Written for **Trope Bingo:** _B1 - Unexpected Friendship_ . . . which gives me bingo! 
> 
> It was also supposed to be written for the Rhodey Appreciation Week but, as you can see, it didn't make it.

It should have been one of the most memorable days of his life; Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes, being ferried off across the stars to act as an ambassador for Earth to a bunch of actual goddamn _aliens_.

But instead, all he could think of was that Tony would have loved this – once he stopped having panic attacks brought on by the sheer vastness of space – and he wasn’t here to see it. Rather than waiting impatiently for whatever alien trinkets James could bring back for him, or right here beside him hashing out plans for negotiations with _actual aliens_ (because had he said that enough yet? Several months in the making, this trip, and he _still_ couldn’t believe it), James’ best friend for literal _decades_ was instead buried under a tree beside the lake that was behind the house he’d shared with Pepper.

Or… _most_ of him was buried there.

James rested a hand on the urn that sat in the windowsill of his room on the _Benatar_. The head of the council he was travelling to see – Nova Prime, he thought the correct title was – had insisted that Tony’s body be brought to them, so that he could lie in state as saviour of the entire universe.

Unsurprisingly, Pepper had not reacted well to the demand, and she had icily suggested that they raise a statue instead. For some reason that the aliens didn’t want to tell them, apparently that wasn’t possible, so a hard-won compromise was finally reached.

Tony had written it into his will that he was to be cremated as there were too many criminals out there who could do terrible, unthinkable things if they ever managed to get hold of any of his DNA, so Pepper had offered a small vial of his ashes to Nova Prime. They had not been pleased but acknowledged that it was the best they were going to get.

So here he was, rooming one last time with Tony, as the Guardians of the Galaxy taxied him to a planet called Xandar. It had seemed fitting that their friendship began and ended with them sharing a room, although he couldn’t help but wish that Tony was actually _here_ to share the room with him. He kept coming across so many new and wonderful things and looking over his shoulder to share them with Tony… only to remember anew every time that his six was empty. Despite the fact they’d had no problems spending long periods of time apart, it half killed him every time it struck him again that Tony wasn’t somewhere out there. Anywhere. At all.

Which was one of the reasons that had James stumbling into the little galley kitchen in search of something resembling coffee at dark o’clock. His body was telling him it was close to three or four am, but with no sun or moon outside the ship, then he had no way of knowing.

“It’s not in there,” an amused voice said, just as James was bent over looking in a lower cabinet. He yelped with surprise, tried to jolt upright, and banged his head on the counter.

“Son of a _bitch_!” he swore, rubbing the back of his head as he straightened up; more carefully, this time.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you heard me come in.” The voice, sounding much more amused, came closer, and James turned to discover a green-skinned woman. “Quill keeps telling me that I need to learn to make more noise when I enter a room, but Nebula says he just doesn’t pay enough attention to his surroundings.” The woman reached out and casually batted his hand away to check the wounded area. Then she leant back and gave him a small smile. “I think you’ll live. Maybe I can help you find what you were looking for?”

“Coffee,” James blurted. “I was, uh, looking for coffee.”

The woman – James was fairly certain that this was who the others called Gamora – tilted her head. “Coffee?” she repeated. “I don’t think I know what that is. Is it a Terran food?”

James could all but _hear_ Tony’s scandalised gasp. _Sacrilege!_ he could hear his friend exclaiming. _Rhodey, save me from these heathens! No, wait, we need to save **them**! They have to be educated on the virtues of a cup of freshly brewed, good strong coffee!_

The thought made his heart hurt, and he had to blink away a sheen of tears before he replied to Gamora, whose expression was becoming more confused by the second.

“No,” he finally replied, and had to clear his throat before he could continue. “No,” he repeated. “It’s not a food, it’s a drink. Quill’s never mentioned it?”

“Quill doesn’t talk about Terra much, apart from the noise he calls music,” Gamora said, her nose wrinkling. “Since I don’t think we have this ‘coffee’, if you would like, I could make you a cup of xzthujsn instead?”

James blinked at her. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that, please?” he asked. It felt as though the language part of his brain had suffered a small seizure at the end of her sentence.

“Xzthujsn,” Gamora repeated, and nope, it didn’t sound any clearer than the previous time. The alien obviously read the confusion on his face – although he suspected that wasn’t hard to do – as she gave him a small smirk. “It’s a stimulant drink,” she explained, reaching around him to pull a bag out of a cupboard behind him. “I suspect it’s the closest to what you were looking for.”

“Oh, right. Thanks,” said James. He shuffled sideways to try and get out of her way in the small galley, and watched as she made the drink with brisk, efficient movements. “Thanks,” he murmured again once she handed the finished drink to him. He braced himself before taking a tentative sip; it had been so long since Quill had been on Earth that he’d forgotten just what kinds of things humans found palatable. Or _not_ palatable, as the case may be.

However, the drink was warm and smooth, if a bit more creamy than James had expected of a stimulant drink. He’d sort of been expecting the immediate kick of an energy booster, or Tony’s hideously strong workshop coffee, but this just seemed to give him a bit of a buzz that settled under his skin.

“’s nice,” he told Gamora as he finished the last of it.

“It should give you a twenty five percent energy boost for the next forty-eight hours,” she informed him.

“Huh, thanks,” he repeated, again. “Might finally help my internal clock to settle.” Gamora tilted her head in confusion. “Oh, right,” James realised. “Space ship. Not much chance of a regular circadian rhythm out here, huh?”

After that, they lapsed into an awkward silence. Or, at least, _James_ did. If Gamora found the silence uncomfortable, she didn’t show it. She wasn’t even leaning back against the cabinets, but instead standing almost in parade rest. It made James remember Nebula’s briefing. Gamora might have been coming to the realisation that her father was wrong, but she’d still been _with_ Thanos at the point of their ‘time heist’ and had been brought to the future by him as part of his army.

It was only Nebula’s word that things had changed that had convinced her to at least not fight _against_ them, and now, here she was, almost a decade into her future with a group of people that had memories and feelings about her that she didn’t share. According to Nebula, at her point in time, Gamora didn’t even have _friends_ , let alone the pseudo-family that the Guardians had been.

“So,” James said, finally, and barely managed not to jump at the sound of his own voice. “You settling in okay?” Gamora gave him one slow blink. “I mean, Nebula said you were brou—” _Nope, better not mention Thanos._ “—Uh, you _came_ from 2014, right? Meeting all the Guardians again? How’s that going for you?”

“Some days are better than others,” she replied, after a moment’s pause. “Sometimes we – _I_ – forget that I haven’t been here all this time. Others, I wonder how I ever ended up with them in the first place.”

“I’m sorry. I know a lot of people on Earth have been having problems reintegrating after the Snap, although obviously that’s different from your situation.” James stomped on the urge to pat Gamora on the shoulder. He wasn’t entirely certain that he’d be able to keep his hand if he did. “Have you spoken to Nebula about it?”

Gamora frowned, and her shoulders tightened. “I find it hard to believe that my sister has changed that much,” she said. “I had been trying to convince her that there was a better life out there than constantly striving – and failing – to please Thanos, but I didn’t think she’d ever turn on him.”

Abruptly, James remembered the moment when he’d watched Tony declare _“I am Iron Man”_ to a crowd of reporters, Pepper’s mouth falling open beside him and Stane’s expression tightening in displeasure where he stood beside Tony. Was this how James’ reaction had looked to Tony? He’d been through such a traumatic event that everyone just assumed it was a kneejerk reaction and that he’d come around again once he’d sorted himself out.

Tony had been adamant that he’d changed for good. It had taken months before people stopped expecting him to act ‘like his old self’.

“You should listen to her,” he said to Gamora. “Nebula’s been through a lot, and it has really changed her. She was devastated when you – the other you – died. I think she sees this as her second chance, to make right all those times she blew you off before.”

Gamora appeared to consider this. “I suppose I could discuss things with her again,” she mused.

“Certainly couldn’t hurt, now that Thanos and his Children are gone,” James pointed out.

She nodded once, briskly. “Now will be a good time,” she decided, and turned on her heel to stride towards the door. She hesitated in the doorway, tapping her fingers against the door frame for a moment. Then, “Thank you,” she said, softly, over her shoulder and departed the galley for an unknown area of the ship, presumably to find Nebula.

“You’re welcome,” said James, equally softly, to the empty air. He could just imagine the smirk Tony would be giving him. _Looks like you made a new alien friend to go with the Blue Meanie, platypus!_ “Yeah, I guess I did,” he agreed out loud.

Determined to try and get some sleep, he headed back to the small room he’d been given. Lowering himself onto the bunk, he stretched out with his arms folded behind his head, staring out through the window at the stars. It really was beautiful out here, and Tony had thought so too, before he’d ended up alone and facing a mere quarter of Thanos’ army.

The ship rounded yet another space rock, and a quick burst of light shone into James’ room, reflecting off of Tony’s urn and making it sparkle.

James couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight. Trust Tony to try and one-up the beauty of the stars, even when he was dead. “Show-off,” he murmured, and closed his eyes. “Night, Tones.”

The urn glittered in the light.


End file.
